Freedom

If theres a top-ten list for the most abused words in the English language,
"freedom" must be up there near the top. To us, freedom means driving
a Porsche with the top down along a gently curving coast road on an endless summer
day with no other
cars for five miles in either direction. Freedom to us means flying around the
world on an open air ticket first class; turning up at the airport and looking
at the departure board
and thinking where shall I go today, Machu Picchu or Nepal; Easter Island or
the Outer
Hebrides?

Our definition of freedom has become indivisible from escapism.

The archetype of freedom is the Exodus from Egypt which we commemorate in the festival
of Pesach. The name for "Egypt" in Hebrew is "Mitzrayim" which
is from the Hebrew word "metzar" meaning "narrow," or
"constriction." Egypt was the ultimate place of constriction. No slave had ever
escaped from there, let alone an entire nation.

When the Torah talks about freedom it always connects it to a clear idea of the purpose
of that freedom. Freedom without a purpose is slavery. When Moshe asks Pharaoh to the let
the Jews leave Mitzrayim, he says "Thus says Hashem: Let My people go 
and they will serve Me." The second part of the statement is the reason for the
first. The only reason we were redeemed from Egypt was so that we could serve Hashem.

But why does Hashem need to be served? What does He get out of it? The answer is 
nothing. We can give nothing to Hashem that He doesnt already have, because
everything we have is His. However, when we serve Hashem it is we who benefit. When we
serve Hashem we establish a relationship with Him. We connect ourselves to the only
Reality that there is. True freedom is being yoked to the truth. To the extent that we
connect ourselves to Hashem, we are connected to reality. This is the definition of
freedom. To the extent that we allow ourselves to be drawn into the myriad of mental
arcade games of escapism we disconnect ourselves from the Real World.

Every Pesach we have a golden opportunity  a launch window  to connect with
this reality, the reality of freedom.

We tend to think of ourselves as being static in time and that time passes around and
over us. We talk of someone as "time has passed him by." In reality, we are the
time travelers.

Time is fixed and we pass through it. Time has fixed points. Stations, if you like. I
remember as a child my father once bought me a train set. It was the most beautiful train
set in the world. (I think he spent half the night putting it together in time for my
birthday.) It came complete with drivers and guards, and people waiting at stations with
suitcases reading little miniature newspapers. But the train always ran in a circle. Over
the bridge, through the tunnel, through the first station, across the level crossing with
the cattle grid to the second station. Round and round, round and round.

Time is like that toy train. We are passengers on a train which travels in an eternal
circle. Every seven days, we go through a station called Shabbos. Its the same
station. Its the same Shabbos. Its the same temporal landscape as last week;
the same Shabbos as the first Shabbos of Creation.

Similarly, every spring we revisit the train station called Pesach. Its the same
Pesach as last year. Its the same as the first Pesach. Thus it contains all the
power of freedom of that first Pesach. Its power is undiluted by the years. Because in
reality, the years have not passed by. The same reality that existed then exists now. The
Exodus from Egypt created a spiritual landscape which is the essence of this time of the
year. Its in the air. All we need to do is to hook into it. We do this by fulfilling
the mitzvos of the Seder. These are our tools by which we can hook into the power
of freedom which is all around us.

Look outside. The trees are blooming. The call of the dove is heard in our land. We
must heed that call. That call of freedom. Each one of us has our own pressures, our own
constrictions, our own little "portable Egypt" that we carry around inside
ourselves. The message of Pesach is that we can escape from our narrow constriction. We
can be free.

We can start again. All we need to do is to hear the voice of the dove. To start anew.
The word for spring in Hebrew is Aviv. The first two letters of the word Aviv are
Aleph and Beis. We can go back to Aleph Beis. We can renew ourselves
as before.

As it says in the Haggadah: "Each person is obliged to see himself as if he
actually came out of Egypt."

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